Regardless of the size of the business, both PPC and SEO are important marketing strategies for a business with a website. You can use either marketing strategy, PPC or SEO, to expand your business. However, it can be a challenge for marketers to figure out the most suitable marketing strategy for their business.
The decision of selecting SEO or PPC depends on the goals of your business and website, the source of your traffic generation, and your target audience. You should also take into consideration the status of your website, how your product or brand fits into your target audience’s buyer journey, and other factors.
It’s important to understand the main differences between these two effective marketing strategies. Let’s take a closer look at parameters like cost, the time required, ease of setting up, and customer trust to differentiate.
| Parameters | SEO | PPC |
| Time to Generate Results | A few months. | Instant generation of results. |
| Ease of Implementation | Complex. It involves many variables and many steps. Can be difficult for a first-timer. | Simple and straightforward to implement. A first-timer can easily and quickly implement it. |
| Budget | The cost depends on the type of service you are using. If you have in-house experts, then it will be cheaper. However, if you hire an SEO agency, then it may cost you more. | PPC strategies can be expensive. The cost is very high, especially for competitive keywords. Also, you need to pay for every click you generate from your ads. |
| Short-term Results | The immediate results are very low. It may help you generate very little traffic in the beginning stages. | It can generate instant results. As the ad runs, your websites will receive higher traffic. |
| Long-term Results | There are long-term benefits of using SEO. It helps you generate high-quality organic traffic to your website. | In time, the impact of your ads on your website decrease. However, you can optimize your ads and improve the performance of your ads. |
| Consumer trust | SEO helps you improve your search engine rankings, build credibility, and win the trust and confidence of your target audience. | It’s challenging to win consumers trust with PPC. Ads look very promotional, and it can be easily blocked. |
Integrate PPC and SEO
To get the best results for your business and achieve your marketing goals, you can combine both PPC and SEO. The integration allows you reap the best of both the marketing strategies.
The major benefits of using PPC and SEO together include:
- When you use both marketing strategy together, it helps you build the credibility of your brand.
- Also, it helps you generate high-quality organic traffic to your website and expand the reach of your business
- You can extract data about conversions and keywords from your PPC campaign and use it in your SEO campaign. This can help you create SEO friendly content for your website and strengthen your SEO strategy.
Check this infographic by SpyFu to learn more about the integration of SEO and PPC.
Author Bio – Zac Harris is the Director of SEO at SpyFu. He is passionate about scaling companies and testing all things SEO.
